What&#039;s happening with CASA?

16 March 2010

Arati Sharma resigned Monday as National Director of the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations. According to a statement released by CASA she is “pursuing new opportunities in her home city of Toronto.”

Other than a brief statement from CASA, a cone of silence has engulfed the situation. With Ms. Sharma on vacation in the Dominican Republic this week, we can’t reach her for comment.

The McMaster Students Union council, the Student Representative Assembly, met Sunday night and were told by their vice-president education Chris Martin that the problems with CASA were such that the McMaster Students Union will be looking at leaving the student lobbying organization. Mr. Martin told the Assembly that Ms. Sharma would be leaving CASA as well and tied her resignation to problems within the organization. The problems were not made entirely clear. Mr. Martin did devote a significant amount of his speaking to the new fee structure that CASA is implementing this coming fiscal year.

Ms. Sharma is the immediate past vice president education of the McMaster Students Union and lead the MSU into CASA. For the MSU to be leaving raises serious questions that need to be answered.

Mr. Martin has not been commenting on the matter since the resignation was made public. In a statement to *The McMaster Silhouette, Martin said *that it is a confidential human resource issue. However, his statements on Sunday raise the question – what’s the truth of the matter?